Improved tissue cryopreservation with nanowarming

Organ transplantation is limited by the availability of viable donor organs. Although storage at very low temperatures (cryopreservation) could extend the time between organ harvest and transplant, the current gold standard for rewarming (convection) leads to cracking and crystallization in samples larger than a few milliliters. Manuchehrabadi et al. demonstrate the rewarming of cells and tissues by radiofrequency inductive heating using magnetic nanoparticles suspended in a cryoprotectant solution. This nanowarming technique rapidly and uniformly rewarmed cryopreserved fibroblasts, porcine arteries, and porcine heart tissues in systems up to 50 ml in volume, yielding tissues with higher viability than convective rewarming.